For more than 40 years, longtime Montreal Gazette food writer and former editor Julian Armstrong has travelled across her adopted home of Quebec, interviewing farmers, producers, and chefs while documenting the regional cuisine. The 82-year-old Toronto native moved to Montreal during the 1960s, and, since then, has become one of the foremost experts on the province’s culinary scene.

The author of the 1990 cookbook A Taste of Quebec (and a revised 2001 edition), Armstrong returns this month with her sophomore title, Made in Quebec: A Culinary Journey (HarperCollins Canada). Part travelogue, part cultural primer, Armstrong spent three years conducting interviews and collecting seasonal recipes from various regions. Although technology would allow Armstrong the ability to do much of her research from home, she prefers an “on the ground” journalistic approach to food writing. “There is no substitute for travelling,” she says.